


A Close Deception

by IAmANonnieMouse



Category: London Spy
Genre: Alex POV, Alex lives, Fix-It, James Bond Crossover, M/M, Mild Angst, Mistaken Identity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-25
Updated: 2017-03-25
Packaged: 2018-10-10 15:26:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10440891
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IAmANonnieMouse/pseuds/IAmANonnieMouse
Summary: “You—” he starts.The Not-Danny turns. “Hello,” he says, clearly confused but too polite to say anything. “Can I help you?”“Sorry,” he forces himself to say. “I thought. You remind me of someone.”“Ah.” The man adjusts his glasses, then extends a hand. “I’m the new Quartermaster here. And you are?”





	

**Author's Note:**

> Slightly angsty-ish? Oops?
> 
> Don't get mad, [a-forger-and-a-point-man.](http://a-forger-and-a-point-man.tumblr.com/)

Alex wakes in stages. At first, he thinks he’s still trapped, folded over himself until his muscles are screaming in pain, but he realizes he can move his legs, his arms, his toes. He’s in a bed. There’s a blood oxygen monitor on his finger, and a mask on his face. If he focuses, he can hear his own labored breath. 

He tries not to focus.

The room is stark, almost too white to look at, completely empty except for the bed and the various machines connected to him.

He doesn’t think this is what the afterlife is supposed to look like.

They must have let him go after he passed out. Except, they haven’t let him go; he can make out someone’s silhouette just outside the room’s cloudy glass door. They’re never going to let him go. 

He turns his head, tries to stretch his neck. His gaze travels to the ceiling, where he spots an unfortunate stain in the tile above him. He immediately looks away, but the damage is done. He looks back up. It’s probably water damage. It breaks the pattern. 

He wonders what Danny would do. Try to distract him. Pull up an episode of _Doctor Who,_ maybe. Kiss him.

He’s never going to see Danny again.

He’s also never going to be allowed to work on his program again, but it’s the loss of Danny that hurts more. In that heart that Danny taught him to care about.

America it is, then. New name, new life, new purpose.

He closes his eyes, remembers Danny’s face, Danny’s brilliant smile. 

At least Danny will be safe.

~+~+~

The next time he wakes, there is a woman at his bedside. She smiles artificially at him. “You’re recovering nicely,” she says.

He shouldn’t need this much time to recover, unless they used drugs or left him in there too long. Or both. He doesn’t want to know. His brain still works; that’s what matters.

She reaches into a small folder tucked under her arm and withdraws a single photo that she holds in front of him. Danny.

“This,” she says, “is over.”

The oxygen mask is gone. He can speak. “I—”

_I understand._

“I know,” he says, instead.

She looks at him shrewdly. “Your work has already been destroyed,” she informs him. “Once you are fully recovered, you will fly to America. We have people over there waiting.”

Alex nods. _I understand._

She smiles again, sharp and brittle, and hands him the small folder. “Goodbye.”

“Goodbye,” he says.

Inside the folder is a passport with his new name: Joseph McCarthy.

_My name is Joe._

He wonders if they chose it on purpose.

~+~+~

Working in America is strange. Everything is opposite, especially the roads. People say thanks instead of ta, smile instead of saying what they mean, shout profanities in the place of affection. Alex can’t crack the code.

He doesn’t know how to understand people. Danny used to be his translator, but.

“Morning, Joe,” Chrystie, the perky, young receptionist, calls as he walks into work. He’s supposed to be an accountant. MI6 isn’t very original.

“Morning.”

“How are you doing, today?”

Alex walks past the desk, pushes the button for the elevator. “Fine.”

_You don’t know me but if you did you’d know I’m always fine._

“I’m fine,” he repeats.

She smiles. “Okay, great! Have a good day!”

“You too.”

She beams as if he’s just proposed to her. “I will, thank you!”

The elevator comes, saves him from his misery, however briefly.

There’s a coffee machine in the office, but no tea. There’s already an assignment waiting for him in his inbox. He sips at the disgusting coffee and scans through the numbers.

Alex can’t crack the code.

~+~+~

One year. The longest three hundred and sixty-five days he’s ever experienced before. He goes to work, talks to Chrystie, forces down a cup of coffee, and works. He goes to his apartment, tries not to list everything that’s different than Danny’s—the stove is the wrong color, the kitchen is larger, the toilet actually flushes on the first try, the windows are wider—and sometimes, if he’s in just the wrong mood, he’ll pull out his computer and hack into London’s CCTV and scan the feeds until he can catch a glimpse of Danny’s rumpled hair, dark coat, thin fingers.

But after a year, after three hundred and sixty-seven days, MI6 decides they need him back in London. They even let him reclaim his old name. It’s still not _his_ name, but it’s closer than Joe. 

They tell him not to contact anyone outside of MI6 from his old life. What they really mean is, don’t contact Danny. 

So he doesn’t. He goes to work and does whatever is asked of him. He goes home and thinks of how different everything is. Of how close Danny is.

He can’t contact Danny.

_I never want to have any secrets ever again._

Danny is safer this way. Better.

~+~+~

He spots him clear across the room. That flash of sloppy dark hair, that arc of the nose. He’s walking over before he’s made the conscious decision, cutting through the flow of people to catch him.

“You—” he starts.

The Not-Danny turns. “Hello,” he says, clearly confused but too polite to say anything. “Can I help you?”

Alex glances over him, takes in the similarities but also the differences. Glasses, posh accent, more subdued, more methodical. A close deception, but nothing like the real thing.

“Sorry,” he forces himself to say. “I thought. You remind me of someone.”

“Ah.” The man adjusts his glasses, then extends a hand. “I’m the new Quartermaster here. And you are?”

“Turner,” Alex says.

_You’ve got to stop shaking my hand._

He shakes the Not-Danny’s hand.

“Good to meet you,” the Not-Danny says, smiling briefly. Nothing like Danny. But so. So close. Almost.

“You as well.” Alex withdraws his hand, turns away.

“Are you in this department?” the Not-Danny asks.

Alex frowns. “No. Cybercrime.”

The Not-Danny tilts his head to the side. “You like computers?”

“A bit.”

“You should come down to Q branch. I could use another brain like yours.”

 _There is no other brain like mine,_ Alex thinks.

“Sure,” he says out loud.

The Not-Danny smiles, nods. “See you soon, then.” He walks away.

Alex almost runs after him.

But it isn’t Danny.

He turns and walks far away.

That night, he hacks the CCTV and stares at Danny’s grainy silhouette in his apartment window for hours.

So close. But.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [Tumblr.](http://iamanonniemouse.tumblr.com/)


End file.
